This Blog Continues at a New Address: Click to visit The Outdoor Swimmer Or copy and paste this URL https://theoutdoorswimmer.wordpress.com/ There are also 2 other blogs I have run in between: Swimming Wild Outdoors and Tri2019 A Triathlon Novice Blog
Having given it some thought I decided that this blog had been about a particular adventure and that it should stand alone. So rather than just running on I have started afresh with a new look and new content at Swimming Wild Outdoors In between writing about individual swims I plan also to include some…
100 swims each at a different place was always going to be a hard target to reach and so it turned out. The final tally is 82, though Lover’s Leap was never blogged as it was a terrible day when I went there in June and the planned revisit simply never happened. The total number…
From the coast path high up on the cliff the waves can be seen barely lapping at the white beach pebbles, which is quite a contrast to Seacombe just a half mile away and where we swam just 20 minutes ago. Looking down from the path the descent looks simple enough along a lazy, shallow…
If anything the surf has picked up a little more since we walked by a few hours earlier. Maybe it is because the tide has turned. Whatever the reason some of the waves are now breaking in a line of tumbling, darting foam that extends point-to-point across the golden sand. The beach is busy so…
I have been wanting to get here for years but somehow it has proved elusive. I have swum off Sunny Cove, the next beach up the Salcombe Estuary and also Mill Bay Cove, the next on again, but this little beach comes and goes with the tide and the timing has never been right. Today…
The sky has greyed over and it looks like there will be no sunset today, which is a shame after the lovely sunny day we’ve had. The fine polished pebbles slide under my feet as I crunch down Slapton ‘Sands’ and step cautiously through the foam left by the crashing waves. though they are not…
The thick fog that blanketed the countryside last night had by mid-day been chased away by the sunshine though the air remained breathless, but turning from the coast road into the dead end that would take me to the cliff top I again entered a world of obscurity. The fog swallowed the car, the trees,…
The day has failed to come clear and now, whilst only 3pm, on this early December day it may as well be early evening and with the light fading it surely won’t turn out right now. I have taken over a little nook at Ayrmer Cove emptying out my bag on the dry sand above…
There are some fascinating sea caves, tunnels and arches along the coast here: Kingswear, Old Mill Cove, Watcombe to name a few, but today’s discoveries are something else. The freezing fog and thick frost had cleared the closer I got to the coast but even so and in the shelter of the car park at…
There is a well worn scuff beside the coast path which suggests a way down the hill but immediately it vanishes down a small slope and into the undergrowth. However, just because you can’t see it does not mean it’s not there. 10 minutes later and a mud slide down a stream bed through a…
The pre-dawn sky is clear and dotted with stars that began to fade as I head north, the sky off to my right brightening and glowing with fiery colour. There is not a breath of wind and the vapour from the factory at Avonmouth rises vertically, spreading, shaping into a massive balloon and I realise…
The walk back to the car from Meldon Pool has dispelled the cold from our fingers and toes and the simple question is, head home or head to Foggintor Quarry? Given that we could be forgiven for thinking, but for the falling leaves, that this was a mid-summer day, Foggintor has an inevitability to it. …
For a brief moment as we were driving along it looked as though the clouds would prevail but when we eventually pulled in to the quarry car park, after a short and unintentional detour to the reservoir, the sky was clear blue under a low sun with not a breath of breeze. There is still…
In the closing chapters of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkein refers to the end of October as the ‘fag end of autumn’. I think we all know what he meant; that time when the trees have all but shed their leaves which lie mouldering underfoot, scenting the air with hint of stale socks. The…
Open Sky Swimming 